Carmina

Catullus

Catullus, Gaius Valerius. The Carmina of Caius Valerius Catullus. Burton, Sir Richard Francis, translator. London, Printed for the Translators, 1894.

  1. Verbose is Venus, loving verbal play!
  2. But, an it please thee, padlockt palate bear,
  3. So in your friendship I have partner-share.
  1. O risible matter (Cato!) and jocose,
  2. Digne of thy hearing, of thy sneering digne.
  3. Laugh (Cato!) an thou love Catullus thine;
  4. The thing is risible, nay, too jocose.
  5. Erstwhile I came upon a lad who a lass
  6. Was . . . and (so please it Dion!) I
  7. Pierced him with stiffest staff and did him die.
  1. Right well are paired these Cinaedes sans shame
  2. Mamurra and Caesar, both of pathic fame.
  3. No wonder! Both are fouled with foulest blight,
  4. One urban being, Formian t'other wight,
  5. And deeply printed with indelible stain:
  6. Morbose is either, and the twin-like twain
  7. Share single Couchlet; peers in shallow lore,
  8. Nor this nor that for lechery hungers more,
  9. As rival wenchers who the maidens claim
  10. Right well are paired these Cinaedes sans shame.
  1. Caelius! That Lesbia of ours, that Lesbia,
  2. That only Lesbia by Catullus loved,
  3. Than self, far fondlier, than all his friends,
  4. She now Where four roads fork, and wind the wynds
  5. Husks the high-minded scions Remus-sprung.
  1. Not if I feigned me that guard of Crete,
  2. Not if with Pegasèan wing I sped,
  3. >Or Ladas I or Perseus plumiped,
  4. Or Rhesus borne in swifty car snow-white:
  5. Add the twain foot-bewing'd and fast of flight,
  6. And of the cursive' winds require the blow:
  7. All these (Camérius!) couldst on me bestow.
  8. Tho' were I wearied to each marrow bone
  9. And by many o' languors clean forgone
  10. Yet I to seek thee (friend!) would still assay.
  1. Rufa the Bolognese drains Rufule dry,
  2. (Wife to Menenius) she 'mid tombs you'll spy,
  3. The same a-snatching supper from the pyre
  4. Following the bread-loaves rolling forth the fire
  5. Till frapped by half-shaved body-burner's ire.
  1. Bare thee some lioness wild in Lybian wold?
  2. Or Scylla barking from low'st inguinal fold?
  3. With so black spirit, of so dure a mould,
  4. E'en voice of suppliant must thou disregard
  5. In latest circumstance ah, heart o'er hard?